27. Go to the V&A Waterfront

Cape Town is AMAZING. After Ghana it's such a break. It's more like
a vacation than a cultural experience. In Ghana, you're always out of
your comfort zone. ALWAYS. You can never blend in. Cape Town was a
180. It was so familiar. The first day I think 70% of the boat went
to the Waterfront. And I think 60% of that 70 went more specifically
the mall. I think the people working thought we had never been to a
civilized location. I was so excited to see stores, fast food, and
especially credit card machines. I saw an "American Express accepted
widely throughout South Africa" sign and practically orgasmed. I'm
pretty sure the checkout lady thought I was crazy so I had to explain
we haven't been in a "developed" area in 44 days. I still don't think
she understood my excitement.

The second portion of the day was spent on an FDP (for class). We
went to two museums, learned about the apartheid a little, and walked
through the company gardens. Cape Town was started as a stopping
point between Europe and the East by the Dutch Eastern Company (or
something like that). So pretty much the entire city was owned by a
private company. Not a government. The language that is spoke is
Afrikaans which is very similar to Dutch. Many if not all are very
fluent in English as well. The most interesting thing I thought about
the museums: We went to two. One is the culture museum and the other
is the natural history (full of animals…especially sea creatures).
The history of tribal groups was put in the natural history museums
and the one about whites (and others) is the "culture" museum. How
crazy is that?!?

That night we went out to Long Street (equivalent to Madison's State
Street). As I'm sure all of you have already heard, I lost my phone/
it was stolen. Because every place was soooo packed people were
always squishing up again each other (sort of like Chaser's at max/
over capacity). This one douche would not let us pass. He was hard
core squishing us as we attempted to pass so I went in front of him
and felt down to an open bag with my phone gone. Obviously I wasn't
100% sure he took it and couldn't hardcore accuse him (especially
since he was black it looked bad) but I'm pretty sure he did it.
Anyways my Brick Hopkins temper came out a little bit but in the end
it wasn't worth it.

I'm actually more upset I lost my cover. It was such a cool case. I
bought a watch to make up for having no time keeping device and I have
an alarm clock so that's good too. For things I want to write down
though I have to now whip out a small notebook and pen (like I'm a
detective) instead of just making a note in my phone. Yeah I'm cool.

I'll just sum up all of my meals. Almost all of them were at the
waterfront. I went to Mitchell's, Hildebran, and Quay Four multiple
times. It was excessive. I also stopped at McyD's (mickee dees)
twice. Whoops.